Richard Farnsworth, 37, of Bellows Falls, was ordered held without bail after pleading innocent Tuesday in White River Junction criminal court to assault charges.

WHITE RIVER JUNCTION ó On the day he was scheduled to begin his court-ordered participation in the stateís Batterers Intervention Program, a Bellows Falls man was back in court facing charges alleging that he choked his new girlfriend and beat her infant son.

Richard Farnsworth, 37, was ordered held without bail Tuesday after he denied violating his recently imposed probation conditions and entered innocent pleas to two felony counts of first- and second-degree aggravated domestic assault. Together the charges carry a maximum potential penalty of 20 years in prison.

Farnsworth had received a suspended three- to 18-month sentence in June after he pulled his ex-girlfriend by her hair away from a family party in Chester and into his car, before punching her and trying to take her cell phone, court records said. His ex told police she had to jump from the moving vehicle to get away from him, the records said.

In that case, he pleaded guilty to misdemeanor domestic assault and to interfering with access to emergency services as part of an agreement that saw prosecutors drop a felony unlawful restraint charge that had originally been filed against him.

As for the latest charges, a woman told Springfield Police that Farnsworth had choked her to the point that she thought she was going to die and had shoved her 7-month-old sonís face into the floor hard enough to leave bruises, according to court records. The woman said she had only been dating Farnsworth for a couple of months at that time.

Springfield Police Officer Jeremy Fitzgibbons said that when Farnsworth was interviewed prior to being arrested he denied that any physical violence had taken place and said the woman told him she acquired the bruises and red marks police were seeing when she fell down a staircase.